The Rock Island Zombie Counteractant Experiment

by Better Hero Army

  “Shoot another one,” O’Farrell suggested.

  “Not yet,” Mason said over his shoulder. “This pistol only holds fifteen rounds.”

  Mason stepped closer to the door and banged on the yellow button again, the one that triggered the bug zappers. He hoped they had recharged by now. Nothing happened.

  Several of the lead zombies broke free of their pack and fanned out wide around the bodies covering the floor. The flow of biters had resumed. Mason stepped in front of O’Farrell again and raised his pistol once more, sighting what he thought might be his next target.

  The door chirped, and both Mason and the doctor looked toward it. It burst open and two soldiers rushed in, each leading with Tasers. As they swept, the weapons turned in both directions. One fired. Snap! Mason’s eyes bulged. The pins rushed through the air, streaming out a thin line of silk. Both needles struck the doctor in the chest and she began to convulse.

  “We’re human,” Mason shouted, holding his hands in the air. “We’re human. Shit.”

  The fire extinguisher fell out of the doctor’s hands and clanked onto the concrete as she toppled. Two more soldiers pushed through the door, each carrying noose poles. Mason caught the doctor as she slumped over, worried he would be struck with a residual shock.

  “Hold the door,” one of the soldiers, a sergeant, shouted behind him. His head swiveled to survey the scene.

  The soldier who had shot the doctor ejected the strings from his weapon and turned it toward the biters without a word. Mason held her by the armpits and turned her, dragging her toward the door.

  “Get her out,” the sergeant ordered Mason. “Set the line. Taze any that close in.”

  Mason yanked the pins and wires from the doctor’s chest and dragged her through the door. The last remaining soldier pushed past him and the door closed behind him, leaving Mason alone with the unconscious doctor in the dark courtyard.

  Mason took a deep breath, his eyes wide from the adrenaline coursing through his veins. It kept him standing, at least. He knew it wouldn’t last, though. He lifted the doctor into his arms and looked around.

  Mason stumbled across the courtyard with Doctor O’Farrell draped in his arms, toward what looked like Chavez’s Jeep. He trudged as fast as he could, listing one way for a dozen steps, then listing the other, his dizziness playing with his perception. To counteract the effect, he focused on one thought: reach the Jeep without dropping her. The alarm wailed from horns mounted on the roof of the prison complex. It was so loud he doubted anyone on the island would still be asleep.

  Mason’s arms gave out as he lifted O’Farrell’s limp body into the Jeep. He collapsed onto her as she fell into the seat. He stood with his weight propping her up, breathing hard, trying not to vomit all over her. He felt a wave of nausea lifting to his throat, but he swallowed it down and let out his breath. It worked to calm his stomach, but his head began to spin wildly. His eyes tumbled like a Newton’s cradle, swinging downward toward the center of his vision, only to be whacked back up to the right by his other eyeball.

  He defied the illusion of his senses and straightened, pushing the doctor against the seat. He grabbed the latch on the seat and leaned her back so she wouldn’t slump forward. Buckling her in brought another wave of nausea he again fought off. He used his hands to guide him around the hood of the vehicle.

  The keys were on the seat. The engine turned over easily and Mason backed them away from the wall, then turned the wheel and raced them toward the gate. The vehicle lights came on automatically. He took a wide turn to drive up beside a call box in front of the gate through the outer wall, the one called the Inside Passage.

  Mason honked on the horn several times. He looked over at the doctor, still out cold and unaffected by the noise.

  “Report,” a voice said through the call box.

  “We shot this woman with a Taser,” Mason said, not looking toward the device. He suspected it had a camera. “She’s one of the lab workers. I’ve got to get her to the infirmary.”

  The call box went silent and Mason wondered what kind of lie he might be able to concoct if pressed, or if he should tell them his own identity and give them his card. The one thing he did know was that any minute the door would open regardless and the rest of the response team would come pouring through.

  The gate opened, empty to his surprise. He drove into the man-trap and stopped to wait for the gate to close behind him.

  “Turn off your lights,” a voice said through a speaker and Mason killed the engine. The gate boomed shut behind him and the blacklights above hummed. Up until this very moment, it hadn’t occurred to Mason that he might register as a zombie, or that his eyes might be glowing as though someone had stuffed two little flashlights behind them. He leaned forward to look in the rear view mirror, but saw nothing but the bloody abrasions just below his eyes. He sighed with relief and heard the buzzing of the other door ahead of him.

  He turned over the engine and put it in gear as light from other vehicles beyond the gate cast over him. Men came through on foot alongside the wall, each outfitted with full body armor, helmets, Tasers, hand-guns, and catching noose poles. Mason pushed past the gate and drove onto the sidewalk to get out of the way of the queue trying to get in.

  He took another deep breath and felt a wave of relief wash over him. The beams of his Jeep shone across the main road onto one of the Quonset huts, and his relief waned. What if this got out of hand? Someone had let out all the zombies. There were thirty men going back in there to try to contain nearly two hundred zombies.

  Mason turned in his seat to look into the man-trap tunnel. The third Jeep edged in just ahead of the door closing behind it. Mason spun around again to look out over the base. He knew the head count on Rock Island. Even though it was a twenty-four hour facility, only ninety-six soldiers were stationed on base at any given time. Mason gauged that number against The Rule. Two-to-one odds against all those zombies, which was more than sufficient to consider it overwhelming force, but at least they were contained to the prison complex.

  The street ahead looked deserted except for the lights of another approaching vehicle. Mason waited for it to pass, leaning over the doctor.

  “Doc.” Mason gently slapped her face. She didn’t stir.

  The other vehicle came out from behind the line of buildings, another open-top Jeep. Mason sat upright again to put his own vehicle into gear. His headlights lit up the passing Jeep and Mason clearly made out the warden and Kennedy in the front seats. Another Jeep followed, then another. The driver of the third looked familiar too, but Mason couldn’t place him. His memories were too muddled.

  The three Jeeps raced toward the bridge leading to the Rurals, toward civilization. Like the prison complex, the bridge leading to the Rurals had a bus-length vehicular man-trap. Enough for three Jeeps, but not four.

  “Shit,” Mason hissed. “They’re bugging out. Doc, wake up!”

  The three Jeeps came to a stop in front of the bridge gate. Mason considered his options. He could force his way. There was room in the other vehicles. The thought only lasted a second, though. The Quonset huts ahead of him, the ones he knew held the sentry ring, yawned open to the night sky with a metallic creak.

  “They’re going to blow the place,” Mason groaned. He grabbed the doctor’s lab coat and shirt at the shoulder as he lurched the vehicle forward. He winced in pain as he turned the wheel using only his left arm. “Doc, come on, wake up!”

  Mason rounded the corner, accelerating toward the Meat Market. Several street lights shone over the nearly empty sidewalks. Two soldiers jogged across the road to avoid being hit. The checkpoint gate went across the road. It was just a wooden guard post. The soldier inside the checkpoint building leaned out, but retreated as Mason revved the engine to burst through the post. It cracked across the hood and windshield.

  Mason felt the doctor stiffen. He looked over at her. His hand was still holding her shoulder so she wouldn’t slip. Her head turned side to side i
n the near darkness.

  “What was that? Where am I?”

  “Doc,” Mason said with relief. “Kennedy is bugging out. We’ve got to get the hell off the island.”

  “Jones?” she asked, turning her head toward him. She put her hand on his where he still gripped her coat and shirt. He felt her lean forward as she tried to sit upright. “Ow! My chest.”

  “We’re almost there,” Mason told her, not letting go of her shirt. He let off the gas and coasted past the Meat Market, then slowed to take a wide turn into the parking lot behind it.

  “What are we doing here?”

  Mason clicked on his high beams as he drove between the two lines of parked slaver rigs. Only two rows could fit in the lot because of their length and size. Mason knew the one that would stand out was the duck, the vehicle he was looking for. He hoped it would still be here.

  “Jones, slow down,” O’Farrell said anxiously.

  Mason plied the brakes and the Jeep ground to a halt over the loose dirt lot. Mason took a deep breath, relieved at seeing the duck’s narrow nose sticking out of the long line of squared engines. Mason blew the Jeep’s horn.

  “Jones,” the doctor said as he stepped out of the Jeep, blowing the horn again. She looked around nervously.

  Mason started around the front of the vehicle. He felt another wave of nausea and dizziness wash over him.

  “Hank, are you up there?” Mason called weakly. He leaned against the hood of the Jeep for support, looking up at the bow of the duck.

  O’Farrell rushed to Mason’s side, putting her arms around his waist and sliding her head under his arm to help him stand.

  “Hank!”

  “Who is it?” the old slaver asked, leaning over the rail above with a blanket around his shoulders. “Kid, you look like shit!”

  “Jones,” the doctor whispered. “What are we doing?”

  “Hank,” Mason called to the slaver. “We need help. We need out.” Mason started walking the length of the duck with O’Farrell’s help.

  “Hang on, kid,” Hank said, shrugging off his blanket to follow them toward the back of the vehicle. Mason’s strength gave out. He knelt down and tried to concentrate on breathing. The doctor removed herself from under his arm and knelt beside Mason. He dry heaved again, falling forward onto his hands. His whole body felt weak to the point that any moment he might collapse without the strength to even breathe.

  “Kid, what’s wrong?” Hank asked anxiously.

  “Jones, you need rest,” O’Farrell said.

  “And who’s she?” Hank asked gruffly. “Who are you?” He glared down at O’Farrell.

  “She’s with me,” Mason said between quick breaths. His arms went limp and he fell onto his right side, gasping. Hank hovered high over them both, watching warily. “We need to get off the island.”

  “Kid,” Hank prodded.

  “Right now,” Mason called as he rolled to his knees, fighting to recapture his lost strength. O’Farrell leaned down to help him. “No time to explain.”

  Across the island there came a bright light followed by a deep, rumbling boom.

  “What was that?” Hank asked, standing straight to look toward the sound. It came from the prison complex.

  “Start the engine,” Mason called as he used O’Farrell to help lift himself to his feet. Even she neglected him a moment to stare with surprise toward the light.

  “Yeah,” Hank replied distantly. “Yeah, good idea.”

  Mason and O’Farrell moved quickly to the back ladder. Against his dizziness, Mason managed to hook his feet and arms from rung to rung as the glow plugs of the diesel engine buzzed beneath the big vehicle.

  “Start the engine,” Mason shouted as he flopped over the rail and onto the deck. Hank was at the driver’s seat flipping switches. O’Farrell shimmied up the ladder and crouched beside Mason.

  “Come on,” she whispered, tugging on him. He nodded and allowed her to guide him forward as the starter chugged and whined, but the engine refused to come to life. It clacked and wheezed as Hank let off on the key. Mason fell into the passenger seat, leaving O’Farrell standing between them as another bright flash lit the sky, followed by a rumbling boom.

  Hank turned the key again. The starting motor whinnied and whirred as the engine chugged and skipped, grumbling out of tune, refusing to start. Hank let off on the key again.

  “You’ve got to be kidding me,” the doctor said.

  Twenty-Four

  The duck wouldn’t start.

  “Shit,” Hank growled, hitting the steering wheel.

  O’Farrell sank to her knees. She looked at Mason with regret. “I thought you were just being paranoid,” she said softly. “About blowing the place up.”

  “Shit, shit, shit,” Hank hissed in cadence with the sputtering engine as the starter turned over and over. “Come on, you piece of junk!”

  Another round of bright flashes lit the hemline of horizon on the other side of the island. The echoing boom of several more explosions followed.

  “What was that?” the doctor asked, her eyes turning toward the glow.

  “The bridge,” Mason guessed.

  The duck growled and chugged to life. A thick fog of black smoke washed over them past the front of the duck, heavy with the fumes of burnt fuel, dissolving as it passed through the still lit headlights of the Jeep. Hank ground the duck into gear and it lurched forward, grazing the front of the Jeep. The doctor fell sideways, losing her balance. Mason grabbed her and pulled her into his lap. The light of the Jeep reflecting up the side of the duck lit her eyes and Mason could plainly see her shock.

  Hank cranked the wheel, and the duck turned abruptly. O’Farrell threw an arm around Mason’s neck for support. The nose of the duck barely missed the rigs parked in front of them as the whole vehicle swung to the right.

  “Where are you going?” the doctor asked frantically.

  “Toward the beach,” Mason answered for Hank. “We need to get into the water.”

  “What beach?” O’Farrell looked out the windshield ahead of them as Hank turned on the floodlights. The parking lot woke under their beams. A row of orange and red reflectors from the two dozen or so rigs lit their path like a runway, and Hank accelerated with his foot on the floor.

  Mason flinched at the thump, tizzzz sound, turning to see a trail of fiery red catapulting skyward. Another thump, tizzzz went off, then another, and another. All four trails raced toward the stars.

  “What is that?” O’Farrell asked in astonishment, her head craned back so she could look straight up. Hank didn’t take his eyes off the road ahead. The duck turned again at the end of the lot and bounced up a curb, missing a small tree that scratched and hissed down the side of the vehicle as they raced by.

  “Cluster bombs,” Mason told her.

  “Why are they going up?”

  “You don’t want to know,” Mason replied grimly. Another thump, tizzzz went off. “Hank, step on it!”

  “It’s floored!”

  The duck fell into and bounded out of a shallow gully meant for water runoff. Mason recognized the wide expanse of grass that they landed on. Another thump, tizzzz lit up the sky.

  “That way,” Mason said, pointing toward a building he vaguely remembered.

  “I know, I know,” Hank cried.

  Another thump, tizzzz went off, and once more. Mason clenched his teeth and looked up to see the sky littered with red contrails.

  The green of the grass in the wash of their floodlights gave way to blackness.

  “There,” Mason shouted, pointing. O’Farrell turned her attention forward. Mason looked up. A false sun lit the sky, a strobe, like streaks of lightning. It sparkled as one after another the cluster bombs began to erupt. Now instead of only a few missiles falling back toward the island, Mason knew there were likely a hundred smaller, more deadly warheads fanning out to destroy every square inch of land.

  Mason gripped O’Farrell’s waist tighter.

  “Hold on,” H
ank warned. He didn’t slow down. Mason reached over his shoulder for the seat belt only to find there wasn’t one. He braced his legs against the floorboard and put one arm onto the dashboard. O’Farrell leaned forward and put her hands on the dash, turning her head to look at Mason with a desperate plea of forgiveness.

  Mason only nodded. He couldn’t tell her they would survive. He doubted it himself. Her eyes were grim in the glow of the spotlights mounted above the windshield. She nodded as well and turned her gaze ahead.

  The duck’s nose pitched off the edge of the grass and onto the gravel beach. Behind him, he heard the boom of the first bombs hitting their targets. Stones rattled beneath the wheels of the duck and the vehicle bounced its nose upward again. It felt like the vehicle knew the danger and was trying to leap out onto the water as far as it could fling itself. Mason felt himself coming off his seat as they cruised through the air.

  More rockets landed behind them, a rattling and insistent knocking and booming sound that shook the very air. The duck slammed to a halt. O’Farrell slumped forward in his grip. His legs burned at the effort of keeping himself from careening forward. His arm gave for a second, but he managed to hold on without crushing O’Farrell against the dashboard.

  The vehicle lurched the other way, and Mason felt himself snapped back into the seat. He hauled the doctor with him. Her elbows dug into his shoulders as she tried to slow herself.

  The duck’s bow carved a line of water into the air that fell over the vehicle as it plunged into the channel, drenching them from head to toe.

  More explosions snapped and boomed all around. Fiery heat poured over them in waves, so strong the air itself grew heavier, driving them further into their seats.

  Hank pushed himself off the steering wheel. He coughed as he worked two levers with his left hand and rubbed his chest with the right.

  “You OK?” Mason asked. More explosions erupted behind them, setting off a chain reaction so loud they each covered their ears. Heat seared over them from a fireball that rolled and toppled out over the channel, rising as it churned and rumbled. More explosions began to strike further inland, blanketing the southern edge in a wave of fire.